Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average hourly earnings of (a) female, (b) male, (c) full-time and (d) part-time employees of his Department were in each of the last five years.
The Department for Work and Pensions pays employees an annual salary rather than an hourly rate.
The Department uses a grade structure to determine salary rates. The grade structure is underpinned by Job Evaluation and Grading Support (JEGS), an analytical job evaluation tool which meets all requirements of legislation and EHRC (Equality and Human Rights Commission) statutory codes of practice on Equal Pay. The use of JEGS and its application in determining the appropriate grade for a role enables us to determine where employees are doing equal work based on “work rated as equivalent”.
DWP Equality data is published on an annual basis on https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-work-pensions/about/equality-and-diversity .This includes the average male and female pay for each year.
In 2015, the gender pay gap in DWP was 3.7%. ONS reported that the mean gender pay gap within the UK was 19.2%, indicating that the gender pay gap within the DWP is considerably narrower than the UK gender pay gap.
Part time employees receive a ‘pro-rated’ salary based on their working hours. Below, we have provided average salaries for part time employees based on the Full Time Equivalent (FTE) salary rate.
2015 Average FTE Salary | |
Full time | Part time (FTE) |
£24,005 | £22,195 |
2014 Average FTE Salary | |
Full time | Part time (FTE) |
£23,663 | £21,882 |
2013 Average FTE Salary | |
Full time | Part time (FTE) |
£23,383 | £21,680 |
2012 Average FTE Salary | |
Full time | Part time (FTE) |
£22,935 | £21,513 |
2011 Average FTE Salary | |
Full time | Part time (FTE) |
£22,830 | £21,393 |
The main factor influencing the DWP gender and working pattern pay gap is the difference in distribution of staff within each of these groups across the grades. DWP continues to regularly review ways to address the pay gap.